Real Housewives of Potomac's Ashley Darby becomes season 1's villain

Chanel Dubofsky is a fiction writer, journalist and editor based in Brooklyn, New York. Her work on gender, sexuality, religion and reproductive justice has been publishing in Cosmopolitan, RH Reality Check, The Billfold, The Toast, The ...

RHOP's Ashley Darby's Googling proves she's too nosy for her own good

Ashley Darby has been a cast member of the Real Housewives of Potomacfor two weeks in a row now, and she's already causing some huge problems. As her first act as a Housewife, she threw a whiskey tasting party in a basement, which horrified the other women, and made it totally worth it in my opinion. On the latest episode, though, she went several steps further when she confessed some less-than-adorable online shenanigans to Katie (who, by the way, is still obsessed with getting Andrew to marry her, lest you think she got over that since the last episode).

Ashley's big reveal is that she Googled the entire cast, Katie included. In an interview, she defended her actions by saying that you just never know with people, and you should have some idea of what's going on with them. I guess, but it's not like these are prospective Tinder dates. Also? Google away, but don't tell people about it. That's like the number one rule of Googling, and rule number two should be that you don't let the producers of the Bravo show you're on convince you to tell the other cast members you Googled them.

Anyway, Ashley's Internet antics revealed what everyone apparently already knows about Katie, mainly that she dated Russell Simmons (Katie would like us to know that they're still BFF's). What Ashley learned about Robyn is the definition of why you keep your mouth shut about things you learn online: Her home, where she lives with her kids and ex-husband, is allegedly in foreclosure and they have almost nothing in the bank. (Cue gasp from Katie.)

And what do you do when you find out someone has been searching for information about you and your friends online? If you're Katie, you go and tell everyone about it, which is exactly what she did, and right before Ashley's cat-themed 27th birthday party, which, to the horror of many, had no open bar. (Note: When Ashley first mentioned the theme of her party, I totally misheard and thought she said "kiddie," prompting a flashback to Ariana's 30th birthday party when Tom was a huge jerk. But anyway, cats!)

Robyn confronted Ashley, clad in animal print, who claimed she had no nefarious intentions towards her. Robyn was skeptical, but agreed to let it go for now. I don't know what to make of this. There's the obviously stupid move on Ashley's part to tell Katie about Googling everyone, and then there's Katie telling everyone about it. Is Ashley just trying to start trouble? If she is, there are far better, more advanced ways to do that. She might want to consider hanging out in Beverly Hills for a while to pick them up.